_________________"If I believe in God and life after death and you do not and if there is no God, we both lose when we die. However, if there is a God, you still lose and I gain everything." - Blaise Pascal

The Warriors-Cleveland Trilogy is a match-up for all-time, all comparisons, and all eyes

OAKLAND–So what if the Warriors and Cavaliers basically turned the NBA regular-season and conference playoffs into a seven-month play-date?

They’re through the prologue. The real show is about to start, picking up right where they left it–Oracle Arena, where the Cavaliers won Game 7 and the 2016 championship, a year after the Warriors won the 2015 title in on Cleveland’s home court.

I believe you recall of that and you know that everything lasting about this season will be defined by what takes place between these two teams in the Finals, starting with Game 1 at Oracle on Thursday.

This is what happens when two all-time assemblages of Hall of Fame talent happen to exist simultaneously, in separate conferences, dwarfing all others and inevitably marching towards each other into the NBA Finals again, it just so happens for an unprecedented third consecutive time this year.

If you yawned through the Warriors’ record-breaking 12-0 sprint through the Western Conference, and doubly-so at the Cavaliers’ 12-1 trot through the East, well, you probably won’t be dozing when LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Draymond Green and their teammates tip it off next week.

These are two teams that have been in the limelight for many years now, have split the last two championships, singularly measure themselves against each other, and understand that when they play each other in the Finals it’s instantly monumental.

“It probably won’t be appreciated until it’s over,” Green said Friday of the Warriors-Cavaliers continued confluence. “I appreciate it. I’m happy we’ve been able to steam roll people and I love the fact that they’ve been able to steam roll people because I just love great things.”

We still have a few days left to go until Game 1. So here are a few more Trilogy themes…

* Green and Curry, as always, have set the emotional tone for the Warriors, and in these playoffs, it’s all about regaining what they lost last June after going up 3-1 in the Finals.

It’s about chasing something, as Curry put it at the beginning of the postseason, not defending anything.

And it goes deeper than just losing the championship to Cleveland.Last June, Curry was the reigning two-time MVP, but went into the Finals limping and clearly wasn’t at the top of his game–he was a cumulative -7 in plus-minus in the series, shot only 40.3 percent from the field and was frequently attacked on defense.

Curry won’t be the MVP this season, is just about as healthy as he could want going into the Finals and is in the middle of his greatest playoff run.

Last June, Green carried two playoff Flagrant foul points and five playoff technical fouls into the Finals, which put him on the precipice of a suspension, and then was suspended for Game 5 after the league issued a retroactive Flagrant foul for flicking James’ groin in Game 4.

Green only has been hit with one technical foul and has zero Flagrant foul points going into the Finals this season.

Also last season, the Warriors were trying to validate a record-breaking 73-victory regular season, and this time around, they have no such burden after winning 67.

* If Steve Kerr doesn’t coach the Finals, and at this point it does not seem likely, it will be the third consecutive Cavaliers-Warriors Finals that has a different coaching match-up.

Which seems odd for a consistent meeting of titans, but circumstances have thwarted coaching continuity–and underscored the incredible value of the lead players involved.

In 2015, it was Kerr vs. Cleveland’s David Blatt.

In 2016, after Blatt was fired mid-season, the Finals match-up was Kerr vs. Tyronn Lue.This time, with Kerr ailing, it is set up to be Warriors acting coach Mike Brown vs. Lue.

Kerr will still be a major part of everything the Warriors do, of course–in fact, he assigned himself the task of going back through all of last year’s Finals games and delivering a scouting conclusion.

I asked Brown what Kerr’s report was: “Just feeling like they could’ve played better in general,” Brown said, with emphasis on some sloppy turnovers.

* Durant will defend LeBron James to start the game, it’s likely that James will defend Durant for long periods, and this is exactly what the Warriors want.. and have envisioned ever since they first dreamed of signing Durant.

Durant has suffered some large losses to James in the past–including losing the 2012 Finals to James’ Heat team when Durant was with the Thunder–but the Warriors coaching staff believes that Durant’s length and tenacity can give James some trouble.

Last year, of course, the Warriors’ starting small forward was Harrison Barnes, who Cleveland basically left open and who shot 35.2 percent in the series.

Let’s just say that Durant will be a somewhat larger presence in this series than Barnes was in the last one.

When the Warriors want to put somebody else on LeBron, it’ll be Andre Iguodala, who won the 2015 Finals MVP largely for his incredible defense on James.

This is the vast luxury of being the Warriors–who else has two (or three or four) guys who can be credible defending LeBron?

This is the greatness of this match-up: LeBron at his best is better than anything the league has seen since Michael Jordan, the Warriors at their best are the greatest team since Jordan’s Bulls, and whoever wins this series probably will be the player or the team everybody else is compared to forever after.

_________________ why suffer to buy expensive stuffs when the best things in life are done naked?

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